Transcript
In New Zealand, it's estimated there are more than 20,000 kava users on an average Friday or Saturday night.
And of these, most are consuming kava at volumes 32 times greater than pharmacologically recommended doses, with many of the users then driving home afterwards.
Those statistics led Waikato University post doctoral researcher Apo Aporosa to research kava drinking and people's subsequent driving reaction times.
Dr Aporosa engaged a group of 20 drinkers and 20 non-drinkers to consume the popluar Pacific beverage.
And after six hours, he says he was suprised to find that the reaction time, perception and attention of kava drinkers hadn't really changed.
"Some of the kava drinkers their reaction time was actually better than some of the non drinkers. And similarly for the divided attention. This is doing something else while driving, like yelling at the kids or changing the radio etc. But I was really surprised that it did not come up with something to show that kava is affecting us in some major way."
Another senior research fellow at University of Waikato's Martin Atkins was called in to help with the study's statistics.
He says as a pakeha, he also enjoys drinking kava and found the results interesting but believes more work is needed.
"There was quite a lot of data from participants and so you have to use some more advanced statistical analyses and so I helped him."
Dr Aporosa, of Fijian descent, says it was also interesting to see the obvious changes within the kava drinking group too, such as slurred speech, slower movements and people appearing to be more sleepy.
He warns people should still exercise caution before driving, especially if they have drunk a lot of kava.
"This doesn't mean then that we can just go and jump into cars and drive around. What it means I think is that we haven't quite used tests sensitive enough and directed at the right brain function."
He also explains the motivation behind his research, which saw him receive a $230,000 grant from the Health Research Council.
"I was a policeman for a number of years and unfortunately I had to clean up roadside motor vehicle accidents and the results of accidents. And I have been drinking kava for many years. And I just wondered, you know?"
New Zealand Police Inspector Gini Welsch works in road safety.
She welcomes the study in a bid to understand what the impairment level of kava use might be and how to ensure community safety.
"I think that the potential for the study from our perspective is to identify any possible prevention activities that we can and we are motivated to try to keep people safe before anything happens and that is really what we are interested in knowing. I am not really aware of anything else where we don't already know much about except for kava and so if anything does come up we want to know more about it to try to keep people safe."
Dr Aporosa says due to cyclones, kava prices have skyrocketed and are now at NZ$100 a kg, whereas when he started this study 18 months ago kava cost just NZ$30 a kg.
He is presenting his preliminary findings at an international conference in England and plans to seek more funding to further his research.
